Spire Global Awarded $6
Million NASA Contract Extension for Earth
Observation Data
June 23, 2022
Spire Global, Inc. has
been awarded a $6 million, 12-month contract
extension from NASA to continue its participation in
the agency’s Commercial Smallsat Data Acquisition
(CSDA) Program.
Spire will continue to
deliver a comprehensive catalog of Earth observation
data, associated metadata, and ancillary information
from its constellation of 100+ multipurpose
satellites. The data provided will include:
Surface data, Spire’s
GNSS Grazing Angle Reflectometry data (GNSS-R), to
measure sea ice extent, classification and
altimetry, soil moisture, and ocean surface wind
speed;
Atmospheric data, Spire’s
GNSS radio occultation (GNSS-RO) soundings, for
weather forecast models to improve global weather
forecasting accuracy;
Space weather offering
measurements of electron density and scintillation
that allow researchers to monitor the ionosphere as
well as prepare for and react to weather events in
space; and
Domain awareness
including satellite state vector, altitude and
precise orbit determination (POD) data to correct
errors in orbital drag models.
Spire’s data will be
available for scientific purposes to all federal
agencies, NASA-funded researchers, and U.S.
government-funded researchers.
“The CSDA Program offers
Earth observation data that is critical to the
efforts of U.S. government agencies and researchers
working to solve some of the biggest challenges we
face, such as climate change,” said Chuck Cash, Vice
President of Federal Sales, Spire. “The program is a
great example of how partnership between the private
and public sector can accelerate our path to
building a better, more sustainable future.”
NASA launched the CSDA
Program in 2017 for the purpose of acquiring
commercial datasets that support NASA’s Earth
science research and application goals. Commercial
datasets provide a cost-effective means to augment
the suite of Earth observations acquired by NASA,
other U.S. government agencies, and international
partners and agencies.
“NASA is continuing our
relationship with Spire Global via the CSDA program
for another year. These data continue to be
leveraged by NASA and its funded researchers, as
well as other partners throughout the U.S.
government,” said Will McCarty, the CSDA Program
Scientist at NASA Headquarters. “We exploit these
observations to better understand the physical
processes associated with our Earth’s atmosphere and
surface, as well as to observe and understand the
solar-driven space weather at the boundary between
the Earth’s atmosphere and space.”
Spire will provide
rolling access to 12 months of radio occultation
data with a 30-day latency. This data will be
archived and maintained by NASA under the CSDA
Program’s Smallsat Data Explorer (SDX) database.
Federal agencies and U.S. government-funded
researchers can request access to the data via the
CSDA Program’s commercial datasets webpage.
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